ST/WH40K wanky fanboy question.

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 4:57 am

Resupply of antimatter. Ship stores last for five years, seven when using the onboard antimatter generator, but making antimatter is comically energy inefficient. The federation uses antimatter anyway because it has an extremely high energy density, so that their ships tankage ratio is orders of magnitude less than a newtonian chemical or even fusion rocket. Anyway, without gigantic factories the size of Nebraska, all the federation magi-tech putters to a halt in seven years.

Lokathor · Post by **Lokathor** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 5:20 am

Calibron wrote:I apologize if this has been addressed, but I'd really rather not wade through all 12 pages of this. What's to stop the federation from becoming a federation of habitation ships instead of a federation of planets whilst they are on a war footing and becoming 100% untouchable by everything in the 40k universe, sans psyker shenanigans?

Production scale. The Federation can't output enough ships to house all of their population permanently or even simply for an extended period. It takes them a few months to a year to produce a ship that houses 1,000 people.

Calibron · Post by **Calibron** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 5:28 am

Hicks wrote:Resupply of antimatter. Ship stores last for five years, seven when using the onboard antimatter generator, but making antimatter is comically energy inefficient. The federation uses antimatter anyway because it has an extremely high energy density, so that their ships tankage ratio is orders of magnitude less than a newtonian chemical or even fusion rocket. Anyway, without gigantic factories the size of Nebraska, all the federation magi-tech putters to a halt in seven years.

I don't actually see why ships that size would be a problem, and resupplying at the various planets covered in orcs, nids, or no one could be done a lot more often than 7 years.

Lokathor wrote:Production scale. The Federation can't output enough ships to house all of their population permanently or even simply for an extended period. It takes them a few months to a year to produce a ship that houses 1,000 people.

I can't imagine why that is, but regardless of whether there's a legitimate reason or just setting inconsistency I'll shut up.

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 5:51 am

The ships are not self sufficient enough to go without resupply from large bases. Large bases/planets are destroyed by imperial ships set to Exterminatus, and blown the fuck up by torpedoes. The federation will win every battle, but the imperium's scorched earth strategy wins the war given sufficient time, and there is sufficient time. The federation is just too small.

The star wars empire also spank the federation much the same way, only faster because they have better lines of communication.

However, the Borg are big enough to win against both the imperium and the empire, and as per the OP would spank them both inside 6 months at the latest.

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 6:00 am

On ship production time, the reason it take so long is that it is cheaper (energy wise) to carve metals from an asteroid, refine and smelt them in a factory, and assemble the pieces in space than to easy-bake and replicate starships.

Furthermore, antimatter is not able to produce energy, only transfer it; even then antimatter is only 50% efficient at maximum because you have to make an equal amount of useless matter for every amount of antimatter made. It is an inherently wasteful process.

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 6:33 am

Yeah, resupply would be a definite issue even aside from the whole anti-matter bit--by trek canon there's a number of rare, naturally occurring materials which replicators cannot produce (at least not efficiently, anyway) due to giant frog, which is why you've still got stations like DS9 around--one of its primary functions was to serve as an industrial ore refinery, if I recall correctly. So while Trek ships are remarkably self-sufficient in many ways mobilizing the entire population doesn't hit me as Plan A by any measure.

Grek · Post by **Grek** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 7:07 am

So, Federation vs. Imperium really comes down to "Can the Imperium hold out against the Federation for at least seven years?"

Zinegata · Post by **Zinegata** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 8:31 am

Calibron wrote:I apologize if this has been addressed, but I'd really rather not wade through all 12 pages of this. What's to stop the federation from becoming a federation of habitation ships instead of a federation of planets whilst they are on a war footing and becoming 100% untouchable by everything in the 40k universe, sans psyker shenanigans?

The better question is why would the Federation bother with the extreme measure of going Battlestar Galactica. Again, the Imperium is not entirely unreasonable. They have signed treaties with outright alien empires or left them alone entirely simply because they're too busy elsewhere.

Also, in a head-on war the question is again how long the Federation can exist against just one sector of the Imperium without resorting to whining about the supposed technological superiority of the Federation navy, when we've never actually fucking seen the Federation warships engaging in anything but close-ranged naval battles more akin to Trafalgar or Tsushima, as opposed to Warhammer 40K where a frigate (which is bigger than a Federation Sovereign class) has an effective engagement range of half a million miles (based on the latest Gaunt novel).

Calibron · Post by **Calibron** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 8:38 am

My original question included "while on a war footing" Zinegata. If they aren't at war then there wouldn't be a need for the, admittedly, extreme measures, and for the issue of the nids and orcs, well, that was addressed pretty effectively by the end of page two. So if they aren't at war with the imperium, the original question of them surviving is well answered, more or less.

Zinegata · Post by **Zinegata** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 8:47 am

Calibron wrote:My original question included "while on a war footing" Zinegata.

That... seriously doesn't clarify matters any. "War footing" simply means you're ready for war. Whether or not you're ready for war, it is still very silly to have the entire civilization go Battlestar Galactica (meaning you leave all of your planets behind and live entirely on ships).

A Galaxy-class vessel - which is probably the most suitable transport vessel given its emphasis on additional space - can carry around 3,000 people, tops. To carry 7 billion humans (present day population of Earth), you need more than two million Galaxy-class vessels. Even if you start doing extreme measures like double-bunking and upping the capacity of each Galaxy-class to 6,000 people, that still leaves you with needing to construct over a million ships!

For reference, during the Dominion War they only managed to build a dozen Galaxy-class, and a large portion of these were apparently from partially completed hulls so they weren't being built from scratch. Heck, at its height the Federation Navy apparently had only a few thousand ships, and this count includes small fighter-class vessels.

Another example? The aftermath of Wolf 359. The Federation lost 39 vessels, and most accounts say it took a minimum of a year to replace all those ships - of which the majority were only relatively older and smaller ships (i.e. Excelsiors.)

How about building larger ships? Well, sorry, but the Federation doesn't have the technology, and they're actually out-teched in this regard by the Romulans whose D'Deridex class is bigger than even the Galaxy-class.

There is simply no realistic scenario where th Federation is going to suddenly materialize 2 million Enterprise Ds out of thin air, and by moving everyone off-world you're denying them useful resource extraction from the planets that they already do own.

Lokathor · Post by **Lokathor** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 9:03 am

The population of Federation planets is probably, on average, much much lower than 7 billion.

Earth went through both World War 3 and the Eugenics War, so they've got a very low population by the time they make First Contact. Also, more tech advanced cultures on earth tend to keep their population growth in check better than less tech advanced ones, so as tech advances they'd probably grow close to their population capacity (loosely speaking) and then people would move off-world.

Calibron · Post by **Calibron** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 9:03 am

When it's a matter of annihilation, you take the planets apart and find new ones when it's safe.

Regardless, apparently there're in setting reasons why they can't, a weird kind of schizo-tech I'd assume, since writers can't guess at what science and technology would actually be capable of at any future point, and, as I'd implied, I'm not really arguing here. I was just wondering.

Grek · Post by **Grek** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 9:09 am

New prediction: The Enterprise shows up in 40K space after going through a dimensional anomaly. They see the Astronomicon on their sensors and go toward that. Then, they see the Emperor on the Golden Throne, fix it and ask him what the hell is going on. The Emperor joins Piccard on the Enterprise as a crew member. Together they retake the galaxy.

E: Piccard eventually gets upgraded to Primarch Piccardus of the Federators Space Marine Chapter.

Zinegata · Post by **Zinegata** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 9:19 am

When it's a matter of annihilation, you take the planets apart and find new ones when it's safe.

Regardless, apparently there're in setting reasons why they can't, a weird kind of schizo-tech I'd assume, since writers can't guess at what science and technology would actually be capable of at any future point, and, as I'd implied, I'm not really arguing here. I was just wondering.

A much more sensible approach is the Halo UNSC strategy - which is to simply use the vast expanses of space to hide your planets. The Imperium can't nuke your planets to a smoking crater if it can't find them.

Actually taking apart planets and moving them is simply logistically impossible and impractical. Going BSG is a culture's last resort for a reason unless they're specifically tailored to be space-gypsies (which the Federation isn't).

Grek wrote:New prediction: The Enterprise shows up in 40K space after going through a dimensional anomaly. They see the Astronomicon on their sensors and go toward that. Then, they see the Emperor on the Golden Throne, fix it and ask him what the hell is going on. The Emperor joins Piccard on the Enterprise as a crew member. Together they retake the galaxy.

See, that scenario actually plays to the Federation's strengths. Star Trek has always been about exploration, diplomacy, and resolving conflicts.

When it tries to fight Galactic-level powers because of the supposed nigh-invulnerability of their ships, it sounds more like the Nazis hoping super weapons like the Me-262 would somehow overturn the Allied overwhelming numerical superiority.

Seriously:

http://foxhugh.files.wordpress.com/2010 ... er-40k.jpg

No amount of parlor tricks will help against a power that can deploy 7 mile long battleships with the mass of an extinction-level-event asteroid.

Calibron · Post by **Calibron** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 10:55 am

Wasn't talking about taking them apart and then putting them back together, I meant more along the lines of stripping them of absolutely every resource feasible, and all the resources of the system while you're at it, and turning those resources into ships; Afterward finding new planets. I already saw the option of "It's not like they can reliably find one of our planets, let alone all of them." early on in the thread, so I was pondering this separate possibility instead of rehashing that old one.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 11:19 am

No amount of parlor tricks will help against a power that can deploy 7 mile long battleships with the mass of an extinction-level-event asteroid.

What? 7 mile long battleships are completely stupid and pointless unless you have some sort of magical space technology that will keep them from being vaporized by a nuclear weapon. 40k stuff is really big, but it's specifically shitty compared to stuff we actually had in the 1970s. The Imperium's stuff fires projectiles with compressed steam. It's an actual joke even as originally written. Let alone what happens when it goes head to head against technology that is actually supposed to look high tech and awesome.

The Imperium shows up with a seven mile long battleship and the Enterprise cuts it in fucking half with a single phaser pulse. Because Imperial Space Hulks are an actual piece of comic relief from a setting that wasn't very serious to begin with.

The Imperium can't lose to the Federation, because it literally has a million times as many people and it is literally impossible for the Federation to conquer it. On the flip side, the Imperium has a lot of weird low-odds planet buster technologies that it will try to use (from virus bombs to warp missiles), and the Federation has only a comparatively few planets with decent numbers of people on them. So sooner or later the Imperium is going to "win".

But the Imperium cannot win any space battle. They do not have a single weapon that the Federation does not laugh at. They do not have a single ship that the Federation cannot vaporize in less time than it takes to give the order to do so.

-Username17

Lokathor · Post by **Lokathor** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 12:28 pm

Calibron wrote:Wasn't talking about taking them apart and then putting them back together, I meant more along the lines of stripping them of absolutely every resource feasible, and all the resources of the system while you're at it, and turning those resources into ships; Afterward finding new planets. I already saw the option of "It's not like they can reliably find one of our planets, let alone all of them." early on in the thread, so I was pondering this separate possibility instead of rehashing that old one.

The Federation could do that if they wanted to. Any space-faring race could do that if they wanted to. I could do that personally if I wanted to. But it all takes various amounts of time. I can't do it before I die, and the Federation couldn't do it in a timely manner as a way to respond to an attack.

When I said "the federation can't go all BSG-mode" and others agreed, we were assuming that there was, you know, a time factor involved. Since they'd be in a war, one would assume, if they were considering that plan at all.

Zinegata · Post by **Zinegata** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 2:18 am

Wasn't talking about taking them apart and then putting them back together, I meant more along the lines of stripping them of absolutely every resource feasible, and all the resources of the system while you're at it, and turning those resources into ships; Afterward finding new planets. I already saw the option of "It's not like they can reliably find one of our planets, let alone all of them." early on in the thread, so I was pondering this separate possibility instead of rehashing that old one.

We don't make a very good space gypsy race.

FrankTrollman wrote:40k stuff is really big, but it's specifically shitty compared to stuff we actually had in the 1970s. The Imperium's stuff fires projectiles with compressed steam.

Nope, they actually use very advanced weapons with high yields and energy weapons (called "lances"), which is more than enough to level populated continents with shielding in a matter of hours. There are literally no Imperial battleship weapons that "fires projectiles with compressed steam" in current lore. See Battlefleet Gothic, which is the 40K game on space combat, or just the wiki.

http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Weap ... _Batteries

Imperial battleships are also crazy tough. Aside from massive shielding, the sheer mass of each warship means that it could lose entire chunks of the ship and still be able to keep on fighting, which has happened in many instances in fluff. The only really silly aspect in Imperial ship design is the ram prow obsession, but actual ramming isn't actually employed often and Star Trek isn't above going "ramming speed" either anyway.

You may want to actually read the updated fluff, especially when you don't even seem to realize that a Space Hulk isn't even an actual ship. It's actually a clumped together bunch of wrecks, which are highly valuable for salvage purposes but may also pose various dangers (navigational hazard, extinction-level asteroid, or carrier of a pest infestation).

The lore's been developed way farther than it's typically given credit for.

The Imperium shows up with a seven mile long battleship and the Enterprise cuts it in fucking half with a single phaser pulse.

LOL. In your dreams Frank.

The Federation doesn't have that capability. They weren't cutting THESE ships in half when they faced them:

http://conservationreport.files.wordpre ... chart3.png

(The 78 km long mutated Voyager, and the 90 kilometer Whale Probe).

In both those cases, the Federation had to revert to its strengths: Which is problem-solving, and not by the barrel of a gun. To appease Voyager, they gave it a husband. To appeas ethe Whale Probe, Kirk punched physics in the face, travelled back in time, and brought back a pair of whales. That's what the Federation is actually good at, not military matters where any military geek just finds their idea of warfare to be sad, stupid, and fail.

Again, Federation space combat tactics involve ships going into formation like this:

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Sacrifi ... _(episode)

Where starships are essentially refighting Tsushima or Trafalgar, as opposed to 40K where a frigate has an effective range of half a million kilometers while travelling at 0.8 C and "formations" have ships seperated by tens of thousands of kilometers and not packed as though they were about to fight as part of a line-ahead formation.

Desdan_Mervolam · Post by **Desdan_Mervolam** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 12:31 pm

The reason why the Federation doesn't load everyone up into orbiting space stations wrapped in impenetrable force fields I think largely boils down to the fact that it would be a PR nightmare and (With notable exception) the Federation has massive delusions of being the Good Guy which just aren't healthy in the Warhammer universe.

I mean really, you can't even get people to evacuate an oncoming natural disaster reliably. If you try to tell people that war is coming, even if you try to explain the scale and depth of what you're facing, there will be a significant number of people who will go "We survived war with the Klingons, the Romulans and the Borg. And from what you are saying there's no difference between them and the Orks, the Eldar and the Tyranid. Hell, the Ferengi were touted forever as the next great threat to the Federation and they turned out to be the alien equivalent of used car salesmen". Pile that on top of "This is MY home and no one's going to take it from me!" attitude that humans are well known for, and the Federation's going to have to force-beam people out for their own good. And that's gone so well for them in the past.

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 4:10 pm

Power creep thanks to authors who take the 40k universe more seriously than its creators originally did does change things up a bit, but an awful lot depends on whether any of the imperium shields are actually worth a shit and if they can shrug off the shit trek ships could pull with warp speed torps.

In any case, that gif still annoys me though because the whole "But the bigness!" argument is hilariously stupid if not backed up by shit that actually matters like shielding and unobtainium.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 5:13 pm

Whipstitch wrote:"But the bigness!"

I can't explain why, but that is one of the funniest things I've read in weeks.

RadiantPhoenix · Post by **RadiantPhoenix** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 6:36 pm

There actually is a point to be made about bigness, which is the square-cube law, which sets a higher minimum on the strength of the materials involved and/or the quality of design, but it's totally possible that the smaller Federation ships could be made out of much stronger materials than necessary or have other tech (like structural integrity fields or something) that effectively makes the materials much stronger than necessary.

Or the 40k stuff could use much lower realspace accelerations to reduce their stresses.

Also, shields and stuff.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 7:16 pm

Zinegata wrote:No amount of parlor tricks will help against a power that can deploy 7 mile long battleships with the mass of an extinction-level-event asteroid.

Yeah, I just want to chime in to say that the thing you said here is bad and you should feel bad. Nobody gives a fuck about seven mile long ships, because they are stupid in-setting wankery to how awesome some particular faction maybe that they can deploy such "mighty and terrible" things. Now, that happens in pretty much every setting because people love ridiculously huge things (maybe it's phallic, whatever), so it's kind of a given, but the reality is those ships are stupid and they die as easily as everything else because the destructive power necessary to cut any vaguely non-unobtanium hull in half is very small and all you've really done is consolidate a lot of resources in one very big target.

The only thing that really matters is your magiscience shields, and since magiscience is all handwavey bullshit there's no reason to even attempt to predict what Star Trek weapons do to Imperium shields. Nevertheless, it still stands that Star Trek routinely engages in FTL tactical combat with FTL capable weaponry, so the Imperium never hits anything, ever, and Star Trek never misses enough to matter, and it really comes down to who's particular brand of make-shit-up you like more; Star Trek weaponry vs Imperium shields.

jadagul · Post by **jadagul** » Sat Nov 17, 2012 9:04 pm

Bigness actually does matter in one case. Because if you can make big things and accelerate them enough, your enemy can't have planets. At all. Take your 7-mile long battleship, point it at the enemy planet--well, where the planet is going to be--and start accelerating. They can blow your ship up all they want, you still have most of the mass of a 7-mile-long battleship plowing towards the planet at high speed.

(note: I've seen exactly 1 episode of Star Trek and know nothing about WH40K except what I've picked up on this board, so I really don't have a dog in this fight. But sheer size is really useful against more-or-less stationary targets).

K · Post by K » Sat Nov 17, 2012 10:15 pm

jadagul wrote:Bigness actually does matter in one case. Because if you can make big things and accelerate them enough, your enemy can't have planets. At all. Take your 7-mile long battleship, point it at the enemy planet--well, where the planet is going to be--and start accelerating. They can blow your ship up all they want, you still have most of the mass of a 7-mile-long battleship plowing towards the planet at high speed.

(note: I've seen exactly 1 episode of Star Trek and know nothing about WH40K except what I've picked up on this board, so I really don't have a dog in this fight. But sheer size is really useful against more-or-less stationary targets).

Again, bigness does not matter. Mass drivers can be done with relatively small lances of heat-resistant metal and no one can really stop it. You don't need 7-mile spaceships.

That being said, 40K wins any ST v. 40K fight because the Federation has been proven to have no defense against psychic shenanigans. That more than trumps any starship battles that people want to have.